Remnants
by Amber Skye
Summary: (AU--COMPLETE) Five years ago, a tragedy struck the Titans, but the truth concerning the accidents has been hidden. When a young woman named Terra wanders into town and adopts the abandoned Tower as her new home, she begins to uncover what happened.
1. Chapter I

Author's Note: Okay, before you start reading, I have a few explanations! This takes place about five years into the future. Terra is approximately nineteen years old; Cyborg will be around twenty (I'm totally guessing here, I have no idea how old they all are in the TV series, I'm assuming they're all fourteen-sixteen) Also, I know the major character right now is Terra, but this is really going to be focusing more on what happened to the rest of the Titans. Terra just happened to be the best candidate for this particular role right now; it just works best this way. It's also pretty slow to begin with, I promise it will get better later on. Okay! Explanations are over. Please read and review!

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Terra pelted towards the building, her feet slapping on the wet ground and flinging up splashes of water that only succeeded in getting her more soaked. She was balancing a battered backpack on her head as she ran, futilely attempting to keep some of the sheeting rain off her face and head.

A huge flash of lightning illuminated the darkened surroundings, revealing her destination as she drew closer. It was a large tower, thin at the base and probably six times as wide at the roof; she wondered absently how it managed to stand solid with so much weight at the top.

The instant of light revealed the overgrown path that led to the double doors at the base of the building. As the flash faded, she tried to keep her eyes focused on the dark shadow of the building, hoping that she wouldn't accidentally run too far off the side of the path. On either side the ground sloped away towards the rocks and shore where waves pulsed with the winds and the tides. In the darkness, and with the rain making the ground slick, even stepping a little ways down the slope could prove dangerous.

A deafening crash of thunder directly overhead nearly made her stumble, but she was close enough now to the building's entrance that she didn't need the next lightning flash to show her where the doorway was. White lines painted on the door were light enough, even in the rain and near-pitch blackness, for her to see. She pressed her weight against the hard, slick surface and fell through, quickly slamming the door behind her against the elements.

It was cool inside the building, and just as dark, but at least it was dry. And judging from the blackness and silence, most likely abandoned too. No one would notice if a homeless teenager spent one night here, just to keep out of the rain.

Another flash split its light through the windows, revealing a positively huge room before her. Terra could see a small stairway leading to another door on the far side of the room. As the lightning faded, she dropped her backpack on the floor and knelt beside it, opening the familiar latch and feeling through the bag. After a few moments, she withdrew her hand, holding her flashlight. She knew the batteries were dying, but until she could find any other means of light, she would use what she had.

Banging the flashlight on her palm to get it started, the faint beam erupted into existence, forming a small patch of weak light in the darkness. She immediately turned it to the walls near the doorway, looking for any light switches. A small panel boasting three of them was revealed in the flashlight's beam, and Terra quickly flicked them all.

Nothing.

She sighed. Of course, she shouldn't be surprised—it wasn't likely that an old, abandoned building would have power left, and especially not during a thunderstorm. Probably half the city had lost power already. Well, it didn't matter too much anyway, she thought to herself, as she wasn't planning on doing much of anything except finding a space to sleep through the night until the storm was over.

Turning her flashlight ahead of her, she surveyed what little she could see of the room. There was what appeared to be a 'living room' area of sorts, with a large, curved couch facing a window and a large TV screen.

_That works,_ she thought to herself. Making her way across the floor space, she dumped her bag at the base of one side, and pulled out a small, tattered blanket that she always carried in it. She wrung it out as best she could before tossing it onto the couch, and proceeded to do the same with her hair and the clothes she was wearing.

When she was a dry as she was likely to be, Terra flopped down on the wide couch, pulled the thin blanket around her, and slept.

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She woke the next morning as something poked her steadily in the ribs. Still half-asleep, Terra absently swatted at the space over her, her hand coming in contact with nothing. As she tried to fade back into the warmth of sleep, the jabbing sensation continued, accompanied by soft mumblings.

Terra sat up this time, rubbing at the sore spot and blinking blearily in the bright sunshine that streamed through the windows.

"Truder, truder!"

She heard the muttering from somewhere behind her, and turned to peer over the back of the couch. Crouching behind the large piece of furniture, his head just poking above the edge of the cushions and staring at her with a single, wide eye, was a strange looking young man.

What skin he had was dark, and in stark contrast to the silvery-blue metal that covered most of his head and face. Only one human eye was visible—in place of the other was a red circle of light, surrounded by more of the metal plating.

Terra stood, surprised to find another person in the tower. Even more to her surprise, he followed her movement, moving into a standing position behind the couch.

He was tall—very tall. Looking up, Terra found that the top of her head would barely come up to his broad shoulders. The rest of his body seemed to be completely composed of the same metal that covered part of his head. Some of it looked rusted, and though she had no idea what he was supposed to look like, she was certain that parts were missing. A large panel on one of his legs was open, showing a network of multi-colored wires. His right hand was completely gone—the metal arm extended down and ended abruptly at the wrist. Another panel on the side of his head was open, revealing more broken, fraying wires and an open, empty plug.

"Truder!" he said again, raising the hand-less arm to point at her.

Terra held up her hands, palms outward, and took a little step backward, trying to show that she wasn't dangerous. "Sorry, do you live here? Listen, I just got caught in the storm last night, and I don't have anyplace to live, so I just thought it would be all right to crash here for the night."

"Truder."

She reached down for he bag, starting to move towards the door. "Okay, I'm leaving, didn't mean to intrude…" Terra stopped for a minute, thinking about what she had just said. She turned to look at her large companion. "Wait, is that what you're saying? Intruder?"

Suddenly he seemed to lose interest in her presence. Turning, he shuffled off, heading up the stairs and through the doorway at the far end of the room.

Baffled, Terra looked after him. There was something strange about him…if he had been calling her an intruder, why hadn't he been able to say it right? He acted like a small child, saying the word in fragments, not seeming to comprehend what she had told him, and getting distracted so easily.

Forgetting that she had just promised to leave, Terra dropped her bag back on the couch and headed after him. The doorway at the top of the stairs opened, revealing an elevator. She blinked, surprised. Then she remembered that this building was very thin at the bottom, and much wider at the top. Surely this large room took up most of the space on the bottom floor. Any other rooms of the building would be on upper floors.

She stepped inside, feeling the sensation of rapid upward movement as the lift started automatically. Turning, she looked for any kind of control panel that might show how many floors there were, or where the elevator might stop, but found none. It stopped as automatically as it had started, the doors sliding apart to reveal a long hallway, extending to either side. Terra exited the lift, and wasn't surprised when the doors slid shut automatically behind her.

Now in the hallway, she looked to either side, searching the area. The android was nowhere in sight—all she could see were several doors placed occasionally in the walls. Curious, Terra began moving down to the right side of the hallway. She stopped in front of the first door, and it slid open for her. Poking her head inside, she found what apparently had been a bedroom.

It was decorated almost entirely in dark shades of blue and gray. A large bed with a strangely carved headboard stood against one wall, draped in midnight blue sheets and blankets, and the carpet was nearly the same color. It was bare of any flourishes. The only objects of furniture were a large dresser and several bookcases.

Bored and unimpressed, Terra moved on to the next room.

It was another bedroom, but much more brightly decorated and a bit unusual. There didn't appear to be a bed, but there was a giant, round, red cushion on one side. It was large enough for a teenager to stretch out and sleep on, if necessary.

A large, red-leather book lay open on the floor. Intrigued, Terra picked it up, closing it to look at the cover. Someone had placed a sticker on the front, and written the words "Starfire's Scrapbook" in swooping, girlish cursive writing. Rolling her eyes, Terra decided to ignore the cutesy writing style and opened to the first page.

It showed a large picture of five teenagers. A boy of perhaps fifteen stood in the front and center, looking tough with his eyes covered by a mask and his face framed by spiky, jet-black hair. In spite of that, he was wearing one of the most ridiculous, tacky outfits Terra had ever seen, with contrasting colors of red and yellow, a black cape, and even green tights.

Beside him was a tall redheaded girl with eyes that were green all the way through, wearing a wide grin on her amber-skinned face.

Crouching in front of them, and also grinning widely, was a boy who could not have been human. His skin and hair were green, his smile revealed small fangs, and his ears were distinctly pointed.

A bit apart from the first three, another girl stood looking annoyed. Her skin was quite pale in contrast to her dark violet eyes and hair. She wore a tight black leotard half covered by a dark blue, hooded cloak. Terra was willing to bet that the previous room she'd seen, with its dark colors, had belonged to that girl.

Behind all of them loomed a large figure that Terra recognized immediately. He was tall and dark-skinned, with only a single human eye. The rest of his face and body was covered with a silvery-blue metal.

The same loopy handwriting from the front cover was scrawled into the picture, assigning a name to each person.

Raven, Robin, Beast Boy, Starfire, and Cyborg.

Above the photo, in large print, were the words Teen Titans.

Terra looked again at Cyborg. It was, without a doubt, the person who had woken her in the downstairs room not too long ago. He appeared to be several years younger in the picture, and of course, was not in such disrepair as she had just seen. He and the rest of the teens in the photo must have lived here in this tower. But now the tower was abandoned…

The sound of footsteps in the hallway caught her attention. Closing the book and tucking it under her arm, Terra exited the bedroom, looking to see who was there. It was Cyborg, of course, who stopped as he heard her approach and turned to regard her with his single eye. Terra thought she saw a flash of recognition cross his face as he raised his arm to point at her and said again, "Truder!"

"You're Cyborg, aren't you?" Terra said, walking up to stand directly in front of him.

He blinked when he heard his name, and lowered his arm.

Terra opened the book and held the picture up for him to see. "This is you, isn't it? And these are your friends?" She pointed to his younger self in the photo. Terra looked up at him to find his face suddenly sad. "What happened to them? Why aren't they here anymore?"

Cyborg put his large, metal hand on top of the photo, looking at it intensely, painfully, and uttered a single word.

"Dead."

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	2. Chapter II

            Author's Note:  Okay, more explanations!  Yes, I know that Terra is dead, so I guess this is going to be somewhat of an Alternate Universe fic.  This is not meant to be a Terra/Cyborg story (I write angst, not romance).  But if you must infer pairings, feel free to do so, everyone is entitled to interpret as they like.

I also know that these chapters are moving pretty slow, don't worry, they'll get better later on, I promise!

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            "Dead?"  Terra repeated, a little shocked.

            Cyborg wasn't looking at the photo anymore.  He was turning away again, shuffling off down the hall, having completely forgotten her presence.  He seemed to sag as he walked away, reminded of something he had not thought of in a long time.  His voice repeated the word over and over as it echoed through the barren hallways and faded with his retreating figure, "…dead…dead…dead…dead…"

            Terra watched him leave, and this time felt no desire to follow.  She looked back down at the photo, surprised at the wave of emotion that had suddenly hit her.  This was the first time she'd ever seen these people—until now, she hadn't even known of their existence.  But somehow, the thought that they were dead made her feel more at a loss than it should have.  She hadn't known them at all…why did she feel such a sudden, strong attachment to them?

            Perhaps because they were so young.  Yes, Terra told herself firmly, it was because they were so young, no one deserved to die at such an early age.  The oldest one among them could not have been more than sixteen years old.

            Still feeling subdued, Terra slumped against the hard, cold wall, letting herself fall into a sitting position.  She paused for a moment, her hand lingering at the edge of the book page.  Her curiosity and strange feeling of attachment prodded at her, and she gave in.  Turning the page, she began to flip through the scrapbook, looking at all the pictures and the notes scribbled under them.

            The Teen Titans had apparently all been very close.  Terra found herself experiencing a pang of jealousy as she gazed at the photos, wishing she had had close friends and family such as this. 

There were several pages showing the Titans on an outing to the beach.  One such photo revealed Beast Boy, buried up to his neck in sand, wincing as a large crab scuttled close to his face and pinched his pointed ear in its claw.  Another displayed Raven dripping wet and looking very displeased as a laughing Cyborg stood over her, an empty water bucket still swinging in his metal grasp.  A third showed Starfire, Beast Boy, and Robin, all three beaming as they posed in front of a gigantic sand castle they had made.

Many of the other photos had been taken inside the tower.  One displayed Robin, sound asleep on the couch, a book lying loosely in his hand.  The photo was larger than most of the others, and had been given its own page.  Whereas most of the other photos had whole sentences scribbled beside or beneath them, this one merely had Robin's name written under it, in very precise, well-scripted letters, with a single heart beside it.  Terra gathered that Starfire, being the author of the scrapbook, had liked Robin quite a bit.

She was getting towards the end of the book now.  Terra turned to the next page, and blinked, a bit surprised.

One of the photos was incomplete. It looked as though someone had cut part of it away.

            What was left of the picture showed Starfire and Raven, and would have included a third person had they not been cut out.  The writing beneath it listed Starfire and Raven's names, which were followed by a fuzzy, discolored patch where it looked as though the third person's name had been erased.

            Frowning, Terra turned the page.

            And found the same thing.

            All the way to the end of the scrapbook, pictures were incomplete.  Someone had gone through the book and completely erased any photo of someone, and the written mention of their name.  Terra couldn't begin to guess who it might have been—it wasn't any one of the Titans from the front page.  They were all still present in the pictures.

            Confused, Terra closed the book and tucked it under her arm.  She wondered why Starfire would have gone to all the trouble to put the scrapbook together, only to go back and destroy parts of it.  Then again, it might not have been Starfire.  Perhaps someone else had gone through and erased the person.

            Terra moved down the hallway again, feeling the blood return to her legs with a stinging sensation, and wondering just how long she had been sitting there.  Trying to get her circulation moving, she decided to walk around some and look into a few of the other rooms.

            She had already seen Raven and Starfire's rooms, she was sure of that.  Each of the Titan members appeared to have distinct enough personalities to guess what room had belonged to whom.  Terra explored three more rooms, easily figuring out which ones had belonged to Beast Boy, Cyborg, and Robin.

            As she exited Robin's room, she realized that there were still two more doors at the very end of the hall.  The one closest to her appeared to be locked, and after a few moments of prying, Terra gave up on trying to get in.  The other door, however, was open.  In fact, she was surprised that she had not noticed before how it seemed to have been damaged somewhat.  Terra pushed it gently to allow slightly more room for her to slip inside.

            The room was a mess.

            But not the same kind of mess that had greeted her in Beast Boy's room.  That mess had been typical for a normal, healthy teenage boy.  This…this was all wrong.  It looked as though someone had deliberately gone through all the contents of the room with the intent of destroying them.

            The curtains had been ripped down, left in tatters on the floor, with only a few faded scraps left dangling form the hooks above the windows.  There were more than a few slash marks on the wall, where someone had sliced the wallpaper and then torn it.  The sheets and mattress on the bed had also been cut apart.  The tattered remains of the bedcovers lay askew with piles of stuffing from the sunken mattress.  A lamp had been shattered, the glass pieces left on the carpet.  Drawers had been yanked from their places in dressers and overturned, the contents broken and scattered.  A large mirror above one such dresser had been cracked, marring the reflection in the dusty surface.

            Terra picked her way slowly through the room, in awe of the damage.  It had been a bedroom—that much was obvious.  So there _had _been another person living with the Titans.  There had been six of them, not five, and something had happened to cause someone to destroy that person's room and remove evidence of their existence from photos.  Terra wondered if the sixth Titan had been connected to the other Titan's deaths.

Something caught her eye, and she bent down, pushing aside one of the overturned drawers to reveal a beautiful hairclip.  It was broken of course, just like everything else in the room.  Part of a it had been snapped off, but otherwise it was quite pretty.  Terra brushed it off and clipped it gingerly to her hair.  Turning, she looked at her reflection in the shattered mirror.

            She was of average height, with clear, tan skin and a slender figure.  Her eyes were a bright blue, and long, sandy colored hair fell past her shoulders.  Where she had pulled the blond strands back from her face with the butterfly clip, a large scar was revealed.  It traced a wide path down the side of her face, from just above her temple and down past her ear, where it ended just above her jaw line.  She fingered the discolored scar lightly, as always wondering how she had gotten it.

            Terra could not remember her childhood.  In fact, she couldn't remember anything before five years ago, when she had woken up in a tiny cave on the outskirts of a nameless town.  She'd woken with a headache and no memory of how she'd gotten there.  The only reason she knew her own name was because she'd had a bracelet with the name 'Terra' strung on letter beads.  The reason for her concussion was, of course, the large head wound that had been fresh at the time.  In time it had healed, leaving only the scar that now adorned the side of her face. Sighing, Terra pulled the clip out of her hair and let the strands of hair fall back into place, covering the wound.

            Suddenly, several loud thwacking noises were heard, coming from outside the window.  Then there was a crash, and Terra whirled just in time to see a large rock come flying through one of the already-broken windows.  It managed to take out some of what little glass remained, scattering shards through the air.  Terra ducked as another rock followed it a few seconds later.  More than a little annoyed, she grabbed one of the two rocks and moved to the window.

            Sticking her head out, she saw two young boys on the ground below, tossing rocks at the tower and laughing whenever they smashed another window.  "Hey!"  Terra yelled, chucking the rock back down at them.  "Knock it off!"

            One of the boys caught sight of her and yelped, grabbing onto his friend.  "It's the ghosts!" he shouted, and both boys instantly turned and ran, yelling in fright, nearly tripping over each other in their hasty retreat.

            Their shouts of ghosts confused Terra for a moment before she realized that the boys had thought _she_ was a ghost.  She turned away from the window, surveying the destroyed room with more than curiosity now.  Did they think the tower was haunted?

            Looking back to the window, her gaze turned to the city spread out before her.  Perhaps there was someone in the city who knew about what had happened in this tower—the two boy's shouts of ghosts had been proof of nothing more than rumors and the extent of young children's imaginations, but all rumors had to originate from somewhere.  Besides, Terra reflected, exploring the city couldn't do any harm.

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            Terra watched the large, older man behind the convenience store counter as he took the money for the few items that she had bought.  "I was wondering…" she asked him as he handed her the change, "what do you know about the big tower at the edge of town?"

            The older man raised an eyebrow, surprised.  "Titan Tower?  You'd best not be messin' around that place, missy.  That's a cursed place."

            "Cursed?"  Terra blinked.

            "That it is.  Used to be the envy of the whole city; it was where the Teen Titans lived.  Strange young ones, they were, livin' there without any parents, fightin' crime and such.  They were darn good at it, though, better than the cops even."  He began putting her things into a bag.

            Terra leaned forward.  "What happened?"

            "Disappeared," the man answered, a sad tone striking his voice.  "All of 'em."

            "Just disappeared?"  Terra took the bag as he handed it across the counter to her.  "When?"

            " 'Bout five years ago," he shrugged.  "No one knows what really happened.  One day they were here, the next day, they weren't.  Lots o' people think the place is haunted now.  Some think they see the ghost o' the metal man, walking around the tower, howlin' at night."

            Terra thanked the man and left, heading back into the crowded city street and beginning her walk back to the tower.  She paid little attention to her surroundings as she walked, wondering about what the man had told her, and finding herself suddenly determined to find out exactly what had happened five years ago in the abandoned building known as Titan Tower.


	3. Chapter III

Author's Note: First of all, I have to thank everyone who has sent me reviews. You guys have no idea how encouraging you've been—I was really afraid that everyone would get bored with this story, since it's moving so slowly. But all the reviews are good ones, and no one seems disinterested, so I'm going to see this through to its conclusion. I hope you'll all stick with me until then!  
Just to let you all know, I'm not terribly fond of Terra myself, but as Sage of Story mentioned, she's just being used to show what happened.  
And in response to ChocolateCurlz's question as to whether or not there will be misery and pain, I'll give you a hint. Within the next few chapters, the rating on this story will go up to PG-13. Heh heh heh…

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Terra sat in the room that had belonged to Robin, sifting through the countless newspaper articles that were stored there, tacked to the walls and piled on the desks. Having long since lost count of how many she had read through, Terra tossed the most recent one back onto the nearest pile and leaned back, rubbing her bleary eyes.

It had been nearly a week since she'd arrived at the tower. She had taken quite a liking to the large, quiet building, despite the rumors it held of the Titan's deaths and their ghosts. It was comfortable, and the first real place that she might have been able to call a home.

Cyborg didn't seem to mind her presence, although sometimes he would forget that she had been living in the tower with him, and he would point his handless arm at her, repeating the word 'truder' as he did so. Terra had had to remind him several times who she was, and each time he would listen her explanation with blank expression and then shuffle off, unperturbed—at least, until the next time he needed to be reminded.

Once, she had sat down with him and tried to teach him her name. He had seemed to understand at first, and had almost been able to pronounce it correctly. But the next day, she had been 'truder' again, and after her third failed attempt to re-teach him, she had finally given up.

Most of her time had been spent in the tower, going through old records such as the newspaper articles and more photo albums that Starfire had collected. One of the things she had noticed in her search was the recurring name of someone called Slade. Apparently, the man had been a crime lord of some sort, and a major enemy of the Titans themselves. Terra wondered if he might have had anything to do with their disappearances—after all, if Slade was the criminal mastermind he seemed to be, it made sense that he would want to see the Titans dead.

Terra stood and stretched. Her muscles stung in protest, tired and cramped after several hours of doing nothing but sitting cross-legged on the floor and reading article after article on the Teen Titans. She exited Robin's room with the intention of taking a walk along the shoreline of the city, but became distracted as a sudden thought crossed her mind.

Instead of heading down to the elevator and the exit, Terra turned and moved further down the hallway to stand in front of the locked door. She regarded it silently for a moment, wondering how she might be able to get inside. It was the only room left in the tower that she had not been able to explore, and her curiosity with what might be behind the locked doors was now coupled with the idea that it might hold something she was missing in her search.

Unlike those commonly found in normal houses, each door in the tower was similar to a pair of elevator doors. As such, there was no real lock; the doors just seemed to be stuck, and would not open automatically when she walked in front of them, like every other one in the tower did.

On the wall next to each door in the tower was a small control panel, probably meant to be used as a manual override device. The panel beside the locked room, however, had been smashed, leaving a gaping hole with charred edges, exposing bundles of melted, frayed and detached wires.

Seeing no obvious way to get the door open, Terra was debating how best to proceed when she heard the familiar shuffling sound of Cyborg's approach. She didn't turn to acknowledge his presence; most of the time, Cyborg would ignore her completely, so she left him alone, not interfering with his distracted manner and strange habits.

It came as quite a surprise, then, when she suddenly realized that Cyborg was deliberately coming towards her. She looked up to see him staring at the locked door, a strange look on his face. Then a thought struck her, and she tried to get his attention.

"Cyborg, do you know how to open it?"

For a long moment, he gave no response. Then he turned his head slowly to regard her, and she could suddenly see fear reflected in his face.

Confused, Terra tried again. She placed a hand on the door and repeated, "Do you know how to open it?"

It was then that Cyborg did something she would never have expected. Moving faster than she had thought possible, his single hand grabbed at hers, pulling it away from the door and dragging her several steps with it. Shocked and a bit frightened at Cyborg's sudden change in manner, Terra stared up at the large android as he continued to hang onto her arm.

He was shaking his head fervently, still staring at the door. "…don't wanna go, stay back…"

Terra reached up with her free hand and tried to loosen his grasp. "Cyborg, let go, what's wrong?"

"…stay back, leave 'lone, go away…"

He seemed completely focused on the door, even as she desperately tried to get his attention. "Okay, Cyborg, you don't have to go in if you don't want to." Frustrated that he was still ignoring her, Terra suddenly realized that he was not acting aggressively towards _her_, but towards the room. He had pulled her away and was now holding her slightly behind him, as though shielding her from something dangerous.

Although she would see nothing dangerous about a locked door, she wasn't about to argue with a cybernetically enhanced human who was nearly twice her size.

Slowly, Terra began moving away from the door, back down the hallway towards the elevator, trying to get Cyborg to see that she was leaving the locked doorway. He was still holding onto her arm, and it took a few tries and several hard tugs to get his attention, but when he realized that they were going to leave the locked room, he moved with her readily. Halfway to the elevator he let go of her arm and seemed to forget the entire incident.

Terra followed him down to the main room of the tower, lost in thought. There was something in that room that frightened even the formidable-looking Cyborg. Perhaps it would be best to leave whatever was locked inside well enough alone.

Pushing her irritating curiosity aside, she sighed, trying to think of where to go next. Her efforts of investigating the disappearances were painstakingly slow, at best, and were probably more at a dead end than she wanted to admit.

As she stepped out of the tower and into the sunshine that lighted the nearby shoreline, an idea began to form. Perhaps it was time to focus not so much on the Titans themselves, but on those who might have had something to do with their disappearance five years ago--their enemies.

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Terra stood on the empty sidewalk, looking up at the old house before her. She looked back down again at the address that she had scribbled down on a scrap of paper, making sure it was correct.

Just over two weeks of research in the library and the Titan's personal archives had finally paid off—this was the closest she had come to finding out who this mysterious Slade was. Delving through every shred of evidence she could find, Terra had actually been able to track down someone who had apparently worked for Slade at some point. Finding him had been a formidable task by itself, but once she had, he had yielded the vital information that she now held in her hand.

Slade's address.

To be precise, it was the residence of the man who had once been known as Slade. Five years ago, the apparent crime lord had 'retired' so to speak—at least, that's what the former employee had told her.

If this turned out to be a dead end, Terra wasn't sure what she would do. She wasn't even sure if it was wise to be here. After all, did she really want to cross paths with a former criminal who might have caused the deaths of five young teenagers?

At the moment, her sense of curiosity was outweighing her sense of caution, and Terra decided to get it over with before that changed. Crossing her fingers, she climbed the short stairway to the front door and knocked.

After a few long moments, the door opened slightly, revealing the face of a young woman, not much older than Terra herself. The woman stared at her, a strange mixture of suspicion and confusion on her face.

"What do you want?"

Terra had to clear her throat before she answered, having suddenly found that it was dry. "Hi, hope I'm not interrupting anything, listen, my name's Terra, I'm looking for someone named Slade—"

The woman's eyes suddenly widened and her eyebrows shot up. She yanked the door open and virtually dragged Terra inside with one powerful haul. As soon as Terra was through the threshold, the door was slammed shut, and Terra suddenly found herself backed against a wall with a shocked and furious woman hissing in her face.

"Look, I don't know who you are or how you know about him, but what the hell do you think you're doing?"

Terra was stunned into silence for a moment, but finally found herself saying, "Hey, I just need some information and I thought he could help me out."

The woman regarded her strangely. "If you know who he is, then you should know better than to just come waltzing in here, throwing his name around like two-cent candy, thinking he's going to give out information. I suggest you get out of here and forget about it. _Now_."

Before Terra could make a move for the door, a low voice called out from one of the rooms down the hall.

"Who is it, Audrey?"

The woman immediately turned to face the direction of the voice, calling back, "It's no one, sir."

The voice was smooth and controlled, sounding almost dangerous in its calmness. "There is no such thing as someone who is no one, Audrey. Tell me who it is."

"She says her name is Terra, sir, she's of no importance, she's leaving now—"

"Terra?" The voice interrupted, holding a hint of interest.

Audrey, who had been pushing Terra towards the doorway, paused when she heard the change in the voice. She stood motionless, waiting for the man's next response.

"Let her in, Audrey. I would like to speak with this…Terra."

Audrey shot Terra a venomous glance, but gestured for move inside, indicating an open doorway slightly down the hallway and to the left. Terra gave a slight nod of appreciation, and stepped into the darkened room.

It wasn't a large room, more like a formal sitting room with an old-fashioned couch and two high-backed chairs. A long, antique, wooden coffee table rested near the center, slightly angled, creating an island amongst the other items of furniture, and a similar looking side table sat beside one of the chairs. A tall Victorian lamp stood in one corner, casting a yellowish light across the room; the windows were adorned with thin, amber hued drapes, casting the filtering sunlight into the same color as the lamplight. The carpet was a deep red, surprising in its unusual color, but fitting with the rest of the room décor.

A man sat in one of the upright chairs, his hand lingering near a book that lay on the side table next to him. He was tall and apparently middle-aged, with graying hair and an eerily calm aura that seemed to surround his presence. His eyes locked on Terra the moment she entered the room, catching her attention in a penetrating, unblinking gaze.

Terra halted just inside the doorway, unsure of how to proceed under the intensity of his eyes. He remained motionless and silent for a moment that seemed to last longer than it should have. Finally he moved his hand, gesturing towards the couch.

"Please, sit down."

She obeyed, crossing in front of his gaze to sit lightly on the edge of the couch. The atmosphere of the room and the strange demeanor of the man himself made it impossible to relax.

He nodded at her slightly, the expression on his face and in his eyes never changing. "Terra. What brings you here?" His voice was low and smooth, almost hypnotic.

Terra had never been good with tactfulness. She would always find herself getting straight to the point of everything, and more often than not, being too blunt. Idle chat was not something she tolerated easily, much less a practice that she would instigate herself. This was no different. She had known that a conversation with a former criminal was more than likely to be uncomfortable, if not downright unpleasant. Delaying the discussion of the true reason for her visit would only serve to make the situation more uneasy.

Taking a deep breath, she asked seriously, "Are you Slade?"

It disoriented her, the way his face didn't change. He made no reaction to the question, as though it were meaningless. After a moment, he responded, his manner still unperturbed. "That name has not been used for quite some time."

Terra tried to calm herself, wondering why his lack of emotion unnerved her so much. She reassured herself with the fact that even if the conversation was exceedingly unpleasant, it seemed that the man was willing to cooperate at such a direct pace, and it would not last long. "I've been doing some…research. About the Teen Titans. And I wanted to know if you could tell me anything about what happened to them."

He moved, leaning slightly forward on his chair, bringing his intense gaze immensely closer to hers, even though the distance he moved was so little. "You are asking if I killed them," he answered.

Terra's eyes widened. It was then that she realized just how potentially dangerous a situation she had gotten herself into. This man was intelligent—far more intelligent than anyone she had ever met, and her realization did not come from the mere fact that he had been able to see the question through to its inevitable resolution. She understood now that everything about him—his manner, disciplined intensity, calm patience, the intent eyes—reflected the existence of a mind that was far above and beyond her own.

She sat in silence, unable to respond as she fought to contain the uneasiness that had suddenly blossomed into sickening fear.

He leaned back, resuming his previous sitting position, regarding her with the same gaze that he had held from the moment she entered into his presence. "I believe that if this were something you were meant to know, Terra, you would not have to be searching for it."

Again, she said nothing. Because there was nothing to say.

When he spoke again, he did not raise his voice, but somehow, it managed to carry farther than it had before. "Audrey."

The woman appeared after just a moment.

"Please show Terra to the door."

Only when Terra was several blocks away from the house was she able to breathe again.


	4. Chapter IV

Author's Note: Thank you all so much for your reviews, you have given me such confidence with the story that I've even extended it slightly from what it was before. And Sage of Story, I really appreciated your explanation with the story pace in question. I have never read mysteries, and I've never tried to write one before this, so I really had no idea that the slow pace was perfectly acceptable, and even desirable. So thank you for enlightening me!   
Well, now the plot is going to start to move forward more quickly, so if it starts going too fast, please let me know!

---------------------------

The library was nearly empty, and calming in its gentle silence. Terra sat at a small table clustered with computers, positioned in one of the far corners of the library next to a large window. She rested one elbow on the table, chin in hand, watching the screenplay on the monitor.

Her visit with Slade had been two days ago, and she'd decided to ignore the man's implication to stop her search. She was almost regretting the decision now—there was absolutely nothing left for her search for. She had exhausted all her leads, followed every shred of evidence she could find to its inevitable dead end. Everything that she had looked through in the past two days had shown her nothing except what little she already knew.

It had been a small and welcome relief then, when she'd found a video collection hidden behind the large screen TV in the main room of the tower this morning. It had nothing to do with her search for what had happened to the Titans, but at the time, Terra hadn't really cared. So she'd picked through the mass of horror movies, bad kung-fu remakes, and overdone action films until she found something of interest.

Like Starfire and her scrapbooks, Cyborg had apparently liked putting together home videos of himself and his fellow Titans in his spare time. Since Titan Tower didn't have any power for the television, Terra had brought the tapes here to the library and had been absentmindedly watching several of the tapes for a few hours now.

As she watched the images of the teenagers flash across the screen, she found herself wondering what their voices had sounded like. Being in the library, she wasn't able to turn up the sound on the monitor. There were headphones that she might have been able to use, but the librarian on duty hadn't given her any. It was an old woman who wore far too much lipstick and perfume, and had forgotten to take one of the curlers out of her hair. She'd looked annoyed and impatient when Terra had asked how to use the video monitors, so Terra hadn't pushed her luck by asking for headphones.

Terra made herself content with just being able to watch the Titans, and found herself feeling even more of a connection to the young crime fighters; they were more like normal teens than their reputation made them out to be. Right now the video was running as Beast Boy and Cyborg hurried to place a bucket of water over a doorway. Apparently pleased with themselves and the setup of their practical joke, the two partners in mischief hid themselves and turned the camera on the doorway to wait for their victim.

For a few moments, nothing happened. Then the camera bounced slightly as Raven came into view in the hallway. She turned towards the door—

—and phased right through, leaving the door and its hidden peril undisturbed. Terra blinked, surprised at the sudden show of Raven's power, wondering what else the pale girl could do.

Neither Beast Boy nor Cyborg reappeared on the screen, but from the amount of jolting that the video suddenly went through, Terra gathered that they were quite upset at the failure of their practical joke. After a few moments, the screen became still again as the two would-be pranksters waited for someone else who would be more likely caught unawares.

Again, there were several long minutes of nothing, and then the video began to jolt again. Terra wondered if the two mischief-makers heard footsteps. When the scene became still, she could see the shadow of someone on the hallway floor, as another person neared the corner. The shadow grew larger, the camera jumped in expectation…

And the scene ended. Terra found herself staring at nothing but static.

At first, she thought the library monitor had failed, or something of the sort. She twisted the knobs for tint and color, to no avail. Frowning, Terra pulled the tape out, wondering if it had reached its end. But upon inspection, it was obvious that there was plenty of space left on the video. She put the tape back in, and after rewinding it a little ways, watched the scene again with the same result. Frustrated, Terra put the video away, wondering why Beast Boy and Cyborg, with their obvious love of pranks, would stop the camera just before their moment of triumph.

Sliding the next tape into the monitor, Terra watched as it began to play a new scene, showing the hallway at the top of the tower that held all the Titan's rooms. Suddenly Starfire's face came into view, taking up the entire screen with her wide, ditzy grin. She backed away from the camera, gave a little wave, and floated down the hallway to knock on Robin's door, all the while glancing back and forth at the camera, as though to make sure it was truly recording and wouldn't miss a moment of what she was doing.

For a long while, Robin's door remained shut. Starfire appeared to be having a conversation with him through the closed doorway, talking for a few moments and then waiting, listening for his response. Finally the doorway slid open, and Starfire reached through to pull something out.

Robin was dragged into the hallway, in apparent reluctance. When he was fully visible, the reason for his unwillingness was painfully obvious, as the outfit that he was wearing was even more ridiculous and tacky than the usual one shown in his pictures.

It was bright purple, complete with gloves and knee-high boots. Large round gemstones were placed near the collar, at each knee, and on the back of each glove. The whole outfit was crossed with silver highlights, and in fact looked dangerously similar to a boy's version of the clothing that Starfire always wore…

Starfire floated aimlessly around her comrade, seeming quite pleased with herself while Robin stood in a slump, somehow managing to look completely embarrassed and hell-bent on revenge at the same time. He folded his arms and said something, which averted Starfire's attention away from him and back towards the still-open doorway. Starfire flew into the room, re-emerging a moment later, pulling someone else behind her in the same manner that she had dragged Robin out into the hallway to have his new outfit video-taped.

Terra grinned to herself, watching the scene unfold before her as Starfire attempted to coax out her second fashion victim. But as the second person was about to emerge, the scene ended in an abrupt eruption of static.

Now Terra was truly confused. It made no sense that the tapes had ended in such inopportune places, and could not be mere coincidence. She wondered if the same person who had gone through Starfire's scrapbooks had also deleted parts of the videos. It made sense—the tapes had ended at the exact places where someone was about to enter the scene. It must have been the same person who had been cut out of all the photos.

Terra's curiosity was piqued again, but she still had nothing to follow, no place to look.

_ No,_ she thought suddenly. There was one place left to search.

--------------------------

Terra stood once again in front of the locked doorway. It was the only place she could think of that was left, that might hold the final key to all her searching.

She cast about down the hallway, making certain that Cyborg was nowhere nearby. If he saw her trying to get into the room, he would most likely try to stop her again. Even though his intelligence was severely limited in his present condition, Terra had no reservations about what his mechanical strength could do. If he decided that he didn't want her in there, she doubted that he would hold back, or that she would able to reason with him.

Pulling out a small knife that she carried with her, Terra slipped it into the space between the door and the wall, hoping to find some kind of hinge or switch that might help pry the door open. She had never tried to break through a sliding door before, and wasn't sure if it could be done. Still, she used every trick she could think of, to no avail.

After a good half hour, she gave up on the idea of being able to unlock it. Jamming her fingers into the door crack, she pulled as hard as she could, trying to force it open. To her great surprise, it gave way slightly, and the slim opening widened. Now she could fit her fingers comfortably in the space. Encouraged by the unexpected success, Terra tried again. This time the door remained firm.

Undaunted, she took a moment to run into Robin's room and retrieve one of the metal staffs she had seen decorating his walls. His room held more than just countless newspaper articles and information on the Titans and their enemies. He had collected a wide range of weapons and devices, many of which were displayed in his room like trophies.

Wedging the staff into the door opening, Terra hauled on it like a lever, forcing the gap to widen further. Soon it was large enough for her to slip her entire arm through. Pushing herself up against the crack as far as she could, and now jamming her shoulder into the opening, Terra pushed her way further into the room, widening the gap slowly but more easily.

Finally, the door had opened enough for her to slip through sideways. But as she stepped through in short-lived triumph, Terra suddenly understood why Cyborg had tried to keep her from coming into this room.

There were bodies.


	5. Chapter V

Author's Note: Holy crap, look at all these reviews!! This is fantastic! Hey, do you think that by the time this story is over, it might have a hundred reviews? Thank you, everyone, so much; I really didn't think this story was that good, especially since it's all Terra.  
Kudos to BrassBanana and VashTheStampede7123 for figuring out that the bodies would be found in the last chapter!  
To my anonymous reviewer speedy23, there is no need to apologize! You are entitled to your opinion, and besides, it does seem terribly obvious, doesn't it? But I will assure everyone, this is an AU fic, and things may not turn out to be as obvious as they may first appear…  
Thank you, Rowlingfan217, for reminding me to change the rating. Otherwise I would have forgotten! Not a good thing…  
Enough with the author's notes—on to the story!

---------------------

The room was destroyed—two walls and nearly the entire ceiling had collapsed, leaving the floor almost completely covered in large, heavy chunks of debris. Everything was quilted in a thick layer of dust and dirt, so that where Terra had stepped, her footprints could be seen. The air was thick and heavy, stale with the lingering scent of death and long-rotted flesh.

The bodies were nothing more than skeletons, draped in tattered remnants of clothes. Beast Boy and Raven lay in one of the far corners, most of their remains intact. The largest deposit of rubble had fallen on the other side of the room, the vast majority of it missing their bodies and leaving them uncovered by debris for the most part. Protruding from directly beneath the huge pile of detritus, however, a flow of cloth could be seen, yellow and black material that had once been Robin's cape. There was no sign of Starfire.

Terra felt sick.

She turned, suddenly wishing for nothing more in the world than to be out of this horrible room. The feeling of torment and death assaulted her senses, thick, suffocating, inescapable. Hurriedly moving back to the doorway, she managed to trip over a piece of debris, landing on her hands and knees.

She felt something hard and sharp dig into the palm of her hand as she landed. Disoriented by the atmosphere of the room and her sudden fall, Terra latched onto the object subconsciously, grasping it in her fist as she scrambled to her feet.

Even though she knew the opening in the doorway had remained the same, it felt smaller than when she had slipped through from the outside. It seemed to take forever as she tried to squeeze through, as though the door wanted to close on her and keep her inside the room, catch her in its malicious will, entomb her with the bodies of the victims that it had already claimed…

With a short yelp that came with the sudden release in a simultaneous moment of fear and relief, Terra fell out of the room and onto the hard floor of the familiar hallway. She scrambled away from the still-open doorway, making a dash for the elevator.

When she was inside and safely descending away from the room, she began forcing herself to take long, deep breaths, trying to calm down. Her heart still pounded, and her hands still shook, but the panic was slowly receding.

When she was able to think clearly again, she remembered that she was holding something in her hand. Opening her palm, she inspected the object.

It was a piece of metal, albeit a very small and oddly shaped one. It was almost square, except for a rectangular protrusion on one side. She could see miniscule wiring that ran to and fro across the surface of the metal, tiny holes where bundles of the microscopic wire would disappear into the center of the cube, nearly indiscernible points where cable would begin and end.

The elevator halted. Tucking the metal piece into her pocket, Terra stepped out, making her way towards the main entrance of the Tower. Outside, the sun felt warm and full of life, so different from the chilling, death-filled room that had become the tomb for three young teenagers.

Terra shuddered and decided to spend the night somewhere else.

-------------------

It took her a few more days to finally discover the significance of the metal piece that she had found.

When she returned to the tower, she did not venture up to the higher floors anymore. Convincing herself that there was no need to search through the rooms anymore, since she had been doing that for weeks anyway, Terra remained on the ground floor that was the living room.

She went to the library a few more times, watching more of the videos and sometimes sifting through more newspaper articles, but the strange drive to figure out what had happened was gone. After finding the bodies, and coming face to face with the reality that these people had truly _died_…she didn't want to know any more.

Through it all, Terra knew that she was just biding her time. The search was over—but this was the longest time that she had spent in one place. The Tower had become the first place that she might have truly been able to call a home. And at the same time that she didn't want to stay there anymore, she knew that she didn't want to leave either.

But when she returned from the library on the third afternoon, she ran into Cyborg, and the decision was made for her.

Catching sight of her, Cyborg raised his handless arm as he had so many times before, and repeated, "Truder!"

Terra sighed, putting her hand on his arm and pushing down to get him to lower it. "We've been through this, Cyborg, I'm Terra, remember?" She looked up to meet his distracted gaze, and her eyes passed over the open panel on the side of his head for a moment.

Something seemed familiar, and she reached into her pocket, drawing out the piece of metal. The protrusion on the side looked strangely similar to the space in the empty plug that was open on the side of Cyborg's skull plating…

An idea struck her. Terra moved suddenly to stand in front of him, holding the metal up for him to plainly see. "Cyborg, do you know what this is?"

He blinked at it, then a hint of recognition lit his human features. "Memra!"

"It's the piece you're missing, isn't it?"

Cyborg tapped a metal hand gently near the open plating on his head. "Memra!"

Terra had no idea what 'memra' was supposed to mean, but his reaction told her without a doubt that the piece was his. "Hold still, Cyborg, I'm going to give it back to you." She stood on her tiptoes, having to stretch her arm up quite far to reach the panel on his head. She pushed the chip gently into place, then took a step back, waiting.

He turned to regard her, and this time, his gaze was not the empty, distracted gaze of a child that he had worn for so long. It was deep, intelligent…human. Cyborg looked at her, and his single eye widened.

"Terra…"

She blinked, surprised. "Hey, you remembered my name this time!"

"My god…you're older. How did—how long has it been?"

Terra stared at him, suddenly confused. "What do you mean, I'm older?"

Cyborg opened a plate on his arm, looking at one of his chronometers. "Five years…oh my god, it's been five years…" He looked at her again, his face riddled with pain and despair. "I'm so sorry, Terra, I didn't mean to leave you there, I was going to come back for you, I swear, but Robin…"

She took a step towards him, not understanding what he was saying. "Cyborg, what are you talking about?"

He seemed confused by her question. "But, if I haven't had my memory chip for five years… wait… Terra, when did you come back?"

"What do you mean, when did I get back? I've been here for the past three weeks!" Terra was getting frustrated.

A horrible thought suddenly struck Cyborg. He looked down at Terra, a note of fear in his voice. "Terra…do you remember me?"

She stared at him.

"Oh god…" He reached out, brushing back the hair on the side of her face, revealing the wide scar. "…you don't remember any of it, do you? You don't remember what he did to you…"

Terra drew back, wide eyed, holding a hand to the side of her face, fingering the wound. Her voice was almost a whisper. "How did you know that was there?"

"Because," Cyborg took a deep breath, "I was there when you got it."

And suddenly, Terra realized what he was saying. "…the sixth room upstairs…"

He nodded solemnly. "Was yours."

"…and the person who was cut out of all the pictures…"

"You."

Terra stood in silence, her mind reeling. She had woken up five years ago…the same time that the Titans had disappeared. "Cyborg," she said slowly, her voice heavy and serious, "Please tell me what happened."

He sighed heavily, like someone who had been haunted and worn down for years, and began.


	6. Chapter VI

Author's Notes: Oh my goodness, the reviews just keep piling on. Thank you all so much!  
All right, yes, I know last chapter was pretty obvious—sorry, everyone, I did my best! But as to the events that are about to transpire in this chapter and the next, I hope they were not as easy to figure out…  
Just to make sure there is no confusion, everything in italics is flashback. That's how these scenes come out when I try to write them—I can't have somebody narrate it, I have to have it play out in front of me in real time.  
So, everybody ready to find out what really happened? Here comes all the tragedy and angst that I've been holding out on….heh heh heh…

--------------------

_Starfire lingered in the doorway, unsure of how to proceed. She had never had the need to 'tattle' on someone before, and it made her uneasy, especially with the thought that it was most likely one of her trusted friends._

_ Robin noticed her tension. "What's wrong?"_

_ She stepped fully into the room, hearing the familiar sound of the door closing automatically behind her. Holding the paper nervously in her grasp, she moved toward Robin. "I…have found something, but I do not understand it," she started._

_ Raising an eyebrow, Robin lifted a hand, reaching for the papers that she held. "What is it?" He took them, glancing over the first one quickly. As he did so, darkness descended over his features, his eyes narrowing behind the mask, his face pulling into an angry grimace._

_ Starfire was slightly alarmed—she never seen this look on Robin's face before. There was something behind the tightness in his features that made her shudder inside. She nearly jumped as he suddenly crumpled the papers in his hand, and uttered one word in a loathsome growl…_

_ "Terra."_

--------------------

_Terra looked up as the door opened, her wide, blue eyes blinking at Robin as he entered. "What?" she asked._

_ He crossed the space between them with quick, short steps, and when he stood in front of her, tossed the crumpled papers into her lap. "Explain this."_

_ Terra picked up one of the papers, smoothing it out some in order to read it. A look of confusion crossed her face, and she glanced up at Robin. "I don't get it…why are you showing me this?"_

_ "Don't act stupid!" Robin shouted. "You've been feeding this information to Slade, haven't you?"_

_ Starfire, who was hovering at the doorway, was shocked by the fury in Robin's accusation._

_ Terra sat speechless for a moment. Then she stood, her own temper flaring. "How can you even think that? I wouldn't do something like this!"_

_ In one rapid movement, Robin pulled out the metal bo staff from his belt, extended it, and swung it into the side of Terra's face without warning. Terra reeled from the blow, stumbling back into the wall and clutching at her head._

_ Starfire gasped._

_ "Shut up!" Robin was screaming at Terra now, "He's a madman who has murdered innocent people and tried to kill my friends! And you're handing him all the information he needs to keep doing it!" Robin brought the staff up again and swung it down hard, cracking into the back of Terra's skull._

_ She fell to her knees this time, her vision fading from the force of the blow as unconsciousness threatened to overwhelm her. The blackness cleared after a few long moments, and she looked up just in time to see Robin aiming another swing at her._

_ "Robin, what are you doing? Please, stop!" Starfire rushed forward, trying to hold Robin's arms as he continued to beat the staff into Terra's defenseless form. He didn't seem to hear or, or even feel her as she tried to wrench the weapon from his grasp. He continued screaming, swinging at Terra again and again. Her hair looked wet in places, and was clinging to the side of her head. And now the end of Robin's staff was becoming discolored; when he swung it, crimson droplets flew through the air._

_ The door flew open. Alerted by the noise, Raven entered the room, with Beast Boy and Cyborg right behind her. For a moment, all three stood motionless, unable to believe the scene that greeted them. Then suddenly Raven had moved, and now stood between the livid Robin and Terra's motionless body._

_ "Stop," Raven said darkly, her eyes narrowing at the furious teen._

_ "Get out of my way, Raven," Robin said through gritted teeth._

_ Raven's eyes darted across the room to land on Cyborg. "Take Terra out of here," she said._

_ Cyborg nodded dumbly and moved to scoop Terra off the ground. He looked away from the few dark red patches that had appeared on the ground beneath Terra's head, and exited the room quickly._

_ Robin's gaze was focused on Raven. He said nothing._

_ "Why?" Raven's voice seemed smothered in the heavy, tense atmosphere of the room. "Why did you do that, Robin?"_

_ "She was feeding information to Slade! She was giving him everything he needed, just handing it to him on a silver platter so that more innocent people could be manipulated and killed, so that everything we've been working for to bring him down was a waste! I will not accept it!"_

_ Suddenly a tiredness crept into Raven's eyes, too subtle to notice. "Terra wasn't giving anything to Slade," she said, her voice still forceful._

_ "Shut up!" Robin shouted, "How you can defend her after what she did?"_

_ "Because she didn't do anything." Raven's voice suddenly dropped to a near whisper. "I did."_

_ Starfire and Beast Boy gasped audibly, and the fury in Robin's face was replaced for an instant by pure shock. Then the insatiable anger rushed back, and he was practically shaking. "YOU?"_

_ Raven met his gaze squarely. "Yes."_

_ "Raven…" Beast Boy's voice almost cracked, it sounded as though he were close to tears. "Why?"_

_ She turned to look at him, and for a moment she looked genuinely sad. "Because I had to." Then her eyes returned to Robin, "It doesn't matter. But if you have to punish someone, then punish me."_

_ Robin didn't move. Time seemed to have stopped, and no one breathed._

_ He lifted the staff again…_

_ Beast Boy made a choking sound and dashed forward, to late to stop the first blow. "No, Robin, don't! Leave her alone!"_

_ "Out of the way, Beast Boy!"_

_ "Stop it, please!"_

_ "Beast Boy, MOVE!"_

_ "No! I won't let you do it!"_

_ "I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL YOU BOTH!!!"_

_   
Starfire sobbed._

--------------------

_ Cyborg got back to the tower as quickly as he could. Thinking that it might not be safe enough to keep the injured Terra inside the tower itself, and not knowing where else to take her, he had gone to the outskirts of town, leaving her in the small cavern that had been her 'home' before she had come to live with them._

_ Leaving his injured friend alone was against everything he had ever been taught, everything he had ever believed. But he had left more friends in a rapidly worsening situation back at the tower._

_ So he'd dealt with Terra's injuries as best as he knew how, and left her as comfortable as he could. Fortunately, her wounds weren't terribly serious. The gash on the side of her head was the worst, but it wasn't deep enough to have caused permanent damage. He'd managed to stop the bleeding, and so long as she didn't have a concussion, she would be fine._

_ Cyborg reassured himself with the fact that he would be back for Terra, as soon as he could be. He didn't know what had happened, why Robin had suddenly gone crazy and hurt one of his teammates so badly. He didn't know what Terra might have done to cause Robin to do such a thing, but it could not have deserved the severe beating that Robin had given her. And if he'd done that to Terra, what had he done after Raven tried to stop him?_

_ Shuddering inwardly, Cyborg redoubled his pace. He had to get back to the tower. He had to know what had happened, if the rest of his friends were all right…_

_ But when he finally did return, he found himself wishing he had not come back._


	7. Chapter VII

Author's Notes: All right, everyone, thank you so much for all the great reviews! Here is the last segment of the flashbacks. But please stick with me, this isn't the end! There's one more chapter coming…

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_ Cyborg found Robin in Starfire's room, tearing through her beloved scrapbook that she had been working on since her arrival on Earth. He was ripping out every photo of Terra that he could find, and scratching out her name everywhere it was written._

_ Starfire hovered near him, a blubbering, sobbing mess, parts of her hair and clothing literally soaked with the inexhaustible flood of tears. She saw Cyborg as he appeared in the doorway, and immediately flew towards him, clinging to his familiar presence._

_ "Cyborg! You must make him stop! He will not listen to me, and I do not understand why he is doing these horrible things!"_

_ Cyborg rested a metal arm around her shoulders, trying to comfort the hysterical girl as best he could. "It's okay, Star, just let me talk to him…"_

_ Starfire shook her head furiously and began choking and crying louder. "No, no, no! Everything is not okay, he is doing terrible things, but he says it is all Terra's fault! He has gone into her room and destroyed it all, there is nothing left! He has broken all the things in our home that remind him of her, and I have tried to make him stop but he will not listen, and he has…Raven and Beast Boy…Raven and Beast Boy…" Her sentence trailed off into a wracking fit of sobs._

_ "What?" Cyborg was alarmed now. "What about BB and Rae? What did he do?!?"_

_ Starfire tried to calm herself enough to tell him, but only succeeded in acquiring the hiccups, which made her cry even harder. Unable to bring herself to say it, she merely pointed to the room where Robin had nearly killed Terra._

_ Suddenly feeling detached, Cyborg dashed down the hallway to the open doorway._

_ Beast Boy and Raven lay on the floor of the room. The carpeting around them was stained, soaked with their blood. Their features were nearly indiscernible, beaten into swollen, unrecognizable lumps of torn flesh. Pieces of Robin's broken staff were strewn among their limbs._

_ Cyborg took a step backward, desperately fighting the urge to vomit. "My god, Robin…what have you done?"_

_ Robin stopped ripping through Starfire's scrapbook, suddenly aware of Cyborg's voice. He threw the book down on the floor and moved into the hallway, ignoring the sobbing Starfire who was standing just outside the doorway._

_ "You!" Robin shouted, pointing a finger at Cyborg. "What did you do with her?"_

_ Cyborg looked at the Titan leader, his single human eye wide with horror. "…Robin…"_

_ "Where did you hide her?" Robin yelled._

_ "You've lost it, man…" Cyborg backed away from the furious, advancing teen._

_ "Tell me where she is!!"_

_ Tears were flowing slowly down the human side of Cyborg's face now. "I can't do that, Robin. I'm not going to let you hurt anyone else."_

_ Robin was shaking with fury. "You're protecting her now, too? All of this is her fault! Everything! If she had never showed up, Raven wouldn't have given the information to Slade, and she'd still be alive!"_

_ Cyborg's face turned in confusion. "Raven? Raven was…but, why would she do that?"_

_ "It's Terra's fault. Terra's fault. She needs to be punished."_

_ "What's wrong with you?" Cyborg screamed, suddenly feeling a surge of fury and anguish overpower his initial shock. "Look at what you did to Beast Boy and Raven! Look at them, Robin! You killed them! You killed your own friends! And you're blaming someone else for it! You're mad! You're no better than Slade! You're just like him!"_

_ Robin shrieked like something inhuman, making a dive at the larger teen. "DON'T…YOU…EVER…COMPARE ME…TO HIM!" He began tearing at the metal plating on Cyborg's head. "IF YOU DON'T TELL ME WHERE SHE IS, I'LL RIP IT OUT OF YOU!!"_

_ Cyborg fell back, his features suddenly going blank as Robin yanked out his primary memory chip, taking several bundles of wiring with it._

_ Starfire had been sitting in the hallway, wailing as she watched the scene unfold before her. But as Robin attacked Cyborg, a strange atmosphere seemed to descend around the alien girl. She stood and had stopped sobbing, though the tears continued to flow as fast as ever down her amber-skinned face. They were alight now, each droplet catching and reflecting the bright green glow that had suddenly erupted behind Starfire's eyes._

_ Robin held the chip in his hand, standing still for a moment, breathing hard with anger and malicious triumph. He turned his head as movement caught his eye, only to see Starfire advancing on him slowly, her body hovering a few inches off the floor. Her face was twisted into an expression of fury that he had never thought her capable of showing._

_ She could still feel the tormented tears as they poured from her lighted eyes, but she ignored them now. Her fists were hot with the spheres of energy that were now held there, and her burning gaze was fixed on the boy who stood in the center of the hallway._

_ Robin frowned at her approach, gesturing for her to move out of the way. "Don't bother me, Star. I have to find Terra."_

_ Starfire halted in front of him, unmoving. For a long moment, she said nothing, and when she finally did speak, there was such a note of finality in her voice that Robin found himself unable to move, unable to tear himself away from the spot to which he became suddenly riveted._

_ "I could never hurt Robin," she began slowly. "He is my friend, and a good leader to all of us. But he would not do the horrible things that you are doing. You have destroyed my home…you have killed my friends…"_

_ Robin stood in silence, his gaze fixed on the alien girl before him._

_ "I would not hurt Robin," Starfire repeated, raising a hand to point at him. "But you are not Robin anymore."_

_ She released the sphere of energy that she held in her palm, watching it spear through the air to hit Robin full in the chest, sending him flying backward into the shadowed room where Beast Boy and Raven had been killed. His body slammed into the far wall with the force of the blow, and he fell to the ground, gasping for breath._

_ Before he could get back to his feet, Starfire had already released two more bolts of bright green energy, one smashing through the wall to his left, the other tearing through the wall behind him. Again she fired her starbolts, one after another, after another. They ripped through the walls again and again, until they could no longer hold up, and began to collapse. The ceiling started to crumble with them, the giant chunks of debris pummeling down onto Robin's body, crushing him, burying him._

_ Starfire suddenly halted her onslaught as the room began to cave in on itself. Reaching a glowing hand out, she punched through the control panel to the side of the door, ripping out the panel and much of the wiring inside, leaving a gaping hole with charred edges. The doorway slid shut, closing off the scene of destruction and the horrible crashing sound as the room continued to collapse._

_ Cyborg sat on the floor of the hallway, slumped against the hard wall. With his major memory chip removed, and more key cables disconnected from the metal plating in his head, most of the knowledge of who he was had disappeared. He no longer retained the capability to speak properly, because he couldn't remember how. And the other disconnections to his memory banks left him in a constant, unalterable state of confusion and incomprehension._

_ It was with a damaged mind that he turned his distracted gaze to look out the window that he had fallen next to. He stared up through the shattered glass, unable to truly understand what he was seeing as he watched a figure fading away into the sky, leaving a glimmering green trail of tears in the air behind her._


	8. Epilogue

Author's Notes: A huge thank you to everyone who reviewed this story—you have no idea how encouraging you all were! This was a really fun story to write, and I'm glad so many people enjoyed it!  
This is the final chapter.

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Terra stared at Cyborg in stunned silence for long after he had stopped speaking.

The tale that she had just heard was beyond anything she had imagined in the weeks that she had spent searching, looking for the truth. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she must have known that it would not be something she wanted to hear—after all, it involved the deaths of five young teenagers. But for some reason she had never fully stopped to think about what horrors such a thing would involve. To have such trust and friendship, and then to have that trust suddenly betrayed, the friendship thrown away like it meant nothing…it had been enough to drive one of their members into madness, so much so that he had murdered two of his comrades. Then to have one of the remaining friends turn against him in the end…

Terra squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to feel the stinging sensation of the onset of tears. "Why?" she whispered hoarsely.

Cyborg looked as though he wanted to cry, but was unable to. "I don't know. I never found out why any of it really happened. Robin said it was Raven who did it, but he was crazy. He wasn't thinking clearly. I don't know if I can believe him or not."

She sat in silence.

Cyborg leaned forward, his human eye reflecting sincere concern. "I'm sorry, Terra, I wish I knew."

Terra blinked through the tears, a strange, faint sound of determination suddenly appearing behind her voice. "I think I know someone who does."

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Audrey let her in without a fuss this time, although the woman seemed even less pleased at Terra's return than she had during her first arrival. Terra did her best to look apologetic, and moved past Audrey to enter the sitting room.

The man in the chair looked up at her arrival, his face the same as she remembered: intense in its silent calmness. "So…you have returned."

Terra met his gaze, trying to mask the uneasiness that had settled on her. She remembered quite well how afraid she had been the last time she'd come here. But when she had come the first time, it had been only because of her own ignorance coupled with her insatiable curiosity. This time it was different. This time, it was far more personal.

She had been there when the Titans had been killed. It was part of the past that she couldn't remember. It was more than just a need to satisfy a desire to understand—it was the necessity to find out what she had done, who she had been.

Terra remained standing near the doorway. She knew she shouldn't have come again—she never should have gone in the first place—but she was here now, and she wasn't leaving until the final piece was in place.

"I have to know something. And I think you have the answer."

"Do you now?" The man folded his hands, looking at her expectantly.

Terra took a deep breath. "I was one of them. I was a Teen Titan. Did they die…because of me?"

If it was possible, the atmosphere around him seemed to darken. While his expression remained as always, something about his manner was more serious—more dangerous. "Ah, you have been doing more of your research, I see."

"I just need to know…"

"I believe that I distinctly discouraged you from pursuing the matter."

Terra's face closed. "So you don't want to tell me."

For the first time, she thought she saw something different in the expression he held on his face. It was barely noticeable, but it was there… "It seems the damage has already been done."

She was silent for a moment, then felt a sinking feeling as she realized what he must mean. "Then it _was_ me…"

"No. But it should have been."

She winced, uncertain. "I don't understand…"

The familiar gaze had returned, intense, unblinking, the strange notion behind them gone. He folded his hands serenely in front of him. "When you first arrived here, I made you an offer. I needed someone to be my assistant, my operative…but you refused. Of course, your refusal forced me to modify my plans. So I found someone else."

"Raven."

He nodded slightly, as though in approval. "It was not the ideal method, but my needs were dire enough to require and adapt to such inconvenience."

Terra shifted on her feet, unsure of whether to feel relived or guilty. What Robin had said was true, then. She hadn't been working for Slade, she hadn't been the one to give out the information and betray her friends…but because she hadn't, Raven had.

"She was unwilling, of course, but those who are such can always be convinced otherwise. There are limitless methods and possibilities. In fact, I had used similar methods before." A note of mild amusement had entered into his voice. "The ploy that fails to trap one bird may work on another."

Terra had no idea what he was talking about, and merely remained still, waiting for him to continue.

"It worked at first, quite well actually." Now he was no longer looking at her. He had turned his attention to the small table next to him, and was reaching to open one of its side drawers. "But then she was discovered, and I'm sure your research has shown you the rest of what happened. Otherwise you would not have come back to me."

Terra stood silently, at a loss of what to say next. She had found out all she needed to know. A part of her wished that she had never started digging into the Titan's history in the first place, but another part was glad that she knew the truth. Unsure of whether to thank the man before her or just leave, she lingered for a moment.

And in the next instant, the decision was made for her.

Slade had reached into the drawer beside him and pulled out a small pistol, and was now aiming it towards her.

Terra stood, eyes wide, staring at the weapon.

"You do understand, of course, that this was your own mistake, pursuing the truth when you were advised otherwise. While you were still ignorant of the true events, you were not a threat." His eyebrows rose fractionally.

She stood rigid, her mouth suddenly dry as she tried to speak. "What are you doing?"

"Robin was right, you know. It is your fault." His voice was as calm and smooth as ever, his hand holding the gun in a relaxed manner, as though nothing had changed.

"What are you doing?" Terra repeated, trying to keep the panic from sounding in her voice.

"Had you not refused my offer, I would not have been forced to pursue other means. And had I not been forced to pursue other means, none of these events would have happened five years ago. The Titans would still be alive, Robin with them, and had Robin remained alive, I would have been able to eventually fulfill my needs and have him as my apprentice."

Terra could only stare now in fearful silence, her eyes locked on the gun.

The man kept his calm gaze steady. "And as long as we are discussing the things that 'might-have-been', I have another one for you to consider. Had you accepted my offer, your usefulness would have run out eventually, and I would have disposed of you."

Suddenly Terra saw the difference in his face again, the glint behind his eyes…and this time, she recognized it.

Madness.

Like everything else about him, it was mannered, disciplined, controlled…

But it was still there.

"So you see, Terra," Slade added, cocking the hammer of the pistol, "You were supposed to die anyway."

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End file.
